Forget about Prince Charles in charge: Why the Queen will never step aside

Cole Moreton, The Daily Telegraph05.12.2013

Queen Elizabeth II leaves through the Norman Porch of the Palace of Westminster after the State Opening of Parliament on May 8, 2013 in London. British Prime Minister David Cameron pledged a fresh clampdown on immigration in the Queen's Speech, seeking to bolster his right-wing credentials and counter the rise of the UK Independence Party (UKIP).

Sixty years ago, a young woman stood outside Westminster Abbey, preparing to go in. She turned to the six companions beside her and said, “Are you ready, girls?”.

They were. The Maids of Honour had unfurled a long purple velvet and silk train to stretch out 18 feet behind the future Queen Elizabeth, so that she could walk forward to her Coronation.

She entered the Abbey on the morning of June 2, 1953 at the head of a procession of 250 people, including leaders of Church, Crown and State. Kings, queens and presidents from all over the world were among the 8,251 guests waiting inside. Across the nation, 20 million people were watching on the newfangled television sets that many had bought for the occasion, with many more listening to the radio.

The fanfares blared, but those standing close by were reminded that at the centre of all the pomp and ceremony was a slender young woman whose father had died only the previous year.

“The Queen looked so vulnerable, and even younger than her 27 years,” said Lady Jane Rayne Lacey, one of the Maids of Honour, who was then aged 20.

The Coronation was a triumph, bringing inspiration and some healing to a nation still carrying the scars of war. But the weight of it was revealed in a private moment that afternoon, as the new monarch and her companions snatched tea and sandwiches inside Buckingham Palace, before going out on to the balcony to greet the huge crowd.

“The Queen came over to near where I was,” said Lady Jane, “took the crown off and heaved a sigh of relief.”

Sixty years later, as she prepares to return to the Abbey for a service to mark the anniversary, questions are being asked that would have been unthinkable for most of her reign. Is Her Majesty preparing to take off her crown for good? Is she yielding at last to the demands of her age, now 87, and considering stepping back from some of her duties so that her son, Prince Charles, can take up the burden?

Speculation began with the announcement last week that she would miss the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting for the first time since 1973, sending Charles in her place. The official reason is that it is too far to travel, being held in Sri Lanka. “We are reviewing the amount of long-haul travel that is taken by the Queen,” said Buckingham Palace, stressing she was “fighting fit”.

A spokeswoman told The Sunday Telegraph that Her Majesty was “as committed to the Commonwealth as she has ever been during her reign” — but also said the decision not to fly was part of an “ongoing process of looking at her travel arrangements”.

The Queen did not go abroad on official business at all last year, leaving that to younger members of her family. Her only trip this year, to Italy in March, was cancelled when she was hospitalized by gastroenteritis. The Queen’s Speech on Wednesday contained no reference to her future travel plans, a notable break with tradition.

Prince Charles was by her side for the State Opening of Parliament for the first time in 17 years, which caused the speculation to intensify. He had just come back from representing his mother at the abdication party for Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, who had chosen to step down in favour of her 46-year-old son.

At 64, Charles could be forgiven a little envy. There seems to be little chance, however, that our Queen will abdicate. She saw the agony that abdication caused her father, and the instability that threatened the country, when her uncle stepped down unexpectedly as King Edward VIII in 1936.

Much has also been made of the promise she made in a broadcast on her 21st birthday in 1947, knowing what was to come: “I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family, to which we all belong.”

Could she, however, be persuaded to accept Charles as a Regent, as some have suggested this week? And if she did, would that lifting of the crown be a relief?

There is Prince Philip to consider. The Duke of Edinburgh will be 92 next month. He continues to show a fierce commitment to standing by his wife’s side — which led to him being admitted to hospital last year, after spending four hours on his feet in the wind, rain and biting cold at the Jubilee river pageant. He will not slow down while she is still going, but would surely ease up if she did. There is no question that she has earned it, after 15,000 official engagements in the last 30 years alone.

According to law, a Regent can only be appointed if the sovereign is considered unfit to rule, by the written testimony of three or more of the following people: their spouse, the Lord Chancellor, the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Lord Chief Justice of England, and the Master of the Rolls.

However, they can also declare “that they are satisfied by evidence that the sovereign is for some definite cause not available for the performance of those functions”.

That seems to offer a little more wriggle room for the constitutional lawyers, if needed.

A bigger snag may be the Queen’s own sense that this is a job for life. When the young Elizabeth dedicated her life to service, the war had been over for less than two years. She continues to represent the values of those men and women who experienced wartime, in particular their devotion to service and their willingness to make sacrifices. She has also been mythologized lately, in her own lifetime, as a wise woman holding the nation together and keeping prime ministers in their place — although the real Queen may have been displaced in the popular imagination by the version of her played by Helen Mirren.

She has become the national grandmother. The sight of her appearing to jump out of a helicopter with James Bond at the Olympics was the equivalent of a home video in which Granny goes skateboarding. There is affection for her personally; and certainly admiration for her sense of duty.

One reason for the latter is a sense of divine purpose that is often overlooked. The most intimate moment of the Coronation service came when the Archbishop of Canterbury anointed her head, breast and palms with oil. The Queen was dressed at that moment in a simple white linen shift dress, and hidden from the television cameras by a canopy.

“I had tears in my eyes. You couldn’t help but be moved by it,” said Lady Jane Rayne Lacey, who was standing close by. She recalled the service recently on the Radio 4 programme The Reunion. The anointing was a highly significant moment for Elizabeth, a woman of faith. “As Solomon was anointed king by Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet, so be thou anointed, blessed, and consecrated Queen over the Peoples, whom the Lord thy God hath given thee to rule and govern,” said the Archbishop, Dr Geoffrey Fisher.

How could a woman who believes she is Queen by the grace of God ever step back? Pope Benedict showed the way, by breaking with a thousand years of tradition. If divinely appointed popes can retire, so might Her Majesty be able to find a way.

“There is talk in fashionable circles of Soft Regency,” says the constitutional expert Dr Robert Morris, of University College, London. “By that I mean a species of retirement short of Regency or abdication. I think she can probably dish most of the ceremonial stuff. That’s fairly optional, actually. She can send somebody else along to do it. The real biggie was the dissolution of Parliament, but that has gone now. The creation of fixed terms has removed that from the royal prerogative.”

There are still some things that only the monarch can do, he says. “There is some formal business I don’t think she could delegate. For example, she appoints most of the senior clergy of the Church of England. The biggie that’s left is the appointment of a prime minister. She alone can do that.” There is no reason why she could not continue to do it while she remains of sound mind and can signal consent. “As long as she can raise her hand or twitch an eyebrow, that should be enough.”

The most obvious way forward, then, is for the Queen to do less and less, the bare minimum allowed by constitutional demands and her sense of duty, with Prince Charles representing her increasingly often, without a change of title. The people of St Ives may be a little disappointed if he turned up this coming Friday instead of the Queen, but they would surely understand. He is, after all, the Duke of Cornwall.

By his side is a Duchess who often makes a good impression on those she meets. Clarence House says it is “intended” that Camilla will become Princess Consort, but when a primary school pupil asked in January if she would ever become Queen, she laughed and answered, “You never know”.

Before long, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge will also be ready to do more. Their baby is due in mid-July, and will become third-in-line to the throne, so this is a significant moment for the Royal family. It is expected that Prince William will retire as an RAF search and rescue pilot to take up a desk job, leaving him more time to spend with his son or daughter — as well as to perform official duties.

Then there is Prince Harry, who also has the knack of connecting with people. By serving in battle he has earned respect. He has learnt that it is much more useful to be photographed wooing Michelle Obama in Washington than cavorting naked in Las Vegas hotel rooms. Over the past year, Harry has become an asset rather than a problem.

The new generation is coming to maturity. Once more the Royal Family shows signs of expertly shifting with the times, improvising at speed while at the same time striving to represent stability, consistency and the longer view. It needs to do so, because there is a challenge on the horizon.

When the time comes for a succession, all bets will be off. The reinvention of the British that is already taking place will go into overdrive, as a change of monarch causes us to reflect on who we are and what we believe. Some will question what the monarchy is for, or how it is paid for, with a stridency and support that is not possible now.

Prince Charles has indicated that he can adapt to the new realities of life in Britain. It is, for example, impossible to imagine him taking the same explicitly Anglican coronation vows without some sense within the occasion that this is a changed nation, with many cultures and a thousand gods instead of one.

The liturgy may stay the same, but the events that surround it will surely be very different. It is to be hoped, of course, that the next coronation is a long way off.

In the meantime, the Royal family will try to build on the love and respect there is for the Queen so as to carry it forward as a bulwark against any coming storms.

There is every sign of it doing so; in a way that must reassure the woman who once stood at the doors of the Abbey, with the eyes of the world upon her before she had even turned 30.

The imminent royal baby will give the nation a chance to coo. Its parents will continue to be seen as glamorous and appealing. Prince Harry will go on doing his thing, representing the Queen in exotic places in between bouts of putting his life on the line for his country.

The House of Windsor has an eligible action man, a good-looking young couple, an eccentric but persuasive father figure and a serene, wise grandmother. Soon it will have a baby. In terms of public appeal — and in terms the young princes and their card-playing mates in the Armed Forces will understand — that is a Royal Flush.

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Forget about Prince Charles in charge: Why the Queen will never step aside

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